Pacific Dragon
by Lady Eldaelen
Summary: A rift is discovered opening deep in the northern ocean. Scientist are flummoxed by its appearance and cause. The general population doesn't know what to make of it. But the warriors of Earth know the power emanating from it is anything but benevolent. DBZ AU injected with Pac Rim sensibilities. They're totally drift compatible. Can't you feel it?
1. Chapter 1

**Pacific Dragon  
****~ Lady Eldaelen ~**

_Pac Rim  
DBZ_

This is what happens when I actually act on a scribble written off-handedly in the margin of a musing journal. Also, I need a new musing journal.

I'm not a huge fan of italicizing huge swaths of flashback, so let's just agree to take the line breaks as either flashback or point of view changes. Time, also, is more of a guideline, so don't expect an exact following of Dragonball history. Nomenclature, too, is thrown in from both worlds, just go with it. We're all fans here, yeah? Good.

* * *

- Start -

* * *

The Command Center was always the first area to ramp up traffic once Rift Activity had been detected. Techs were already bustling along the aisles, distributing data pads with updated reports, rewiring connections to configure the computers for the predicted battle, passing out coffee and rations to cover for the first Mess Call of the day being hours away yet. At the bank of windows that overlooked the Staging Hangar stood the unassuming overseer of the Jaeger Base's activities. He was young, but he was brilliant. Respected both in tactical command, while piloting a Jaeger, and defending hand-to-hand, Son Gohan was all humanity could have asked for in a leader, and for its sake, he did a damn fine job at it.

"Krillin, what is the projection?" Gohan asked quietly, as was his way. He didn't even turn, preferring to oversee the preparations going on in the Staging Hangar. Just behind him to the right at a large console desk, the battle analyst called up the report in question with a few flicks of his wrist.

"Science Pool expects a Cat-4, probability of a terran adept is at 70%."

Gohan nodded once, but a minute later he followed up with, "And what does Bulma expect?"

Krillin called up an encrypted message sent directly to him. "Two Cat-3s, one 95% probability terran, one 89% probability water-terran hybrid."

"Better make sure everyone's awake."

"Sure thing, boss."

Another nod.

"Hey, Gohan, Bulma also added a personal note: 'Krillin, tell Gohan to suck it up and request another budget review with the Council. I'm still waiting for a new assistant since my last one went and got himself named the de facto leader of this whole operation. Oh, and the likelihood of an airworthy Jaeger getting manufactured before encountering an airworthy Catagory-anything is quickly dropping to zero, so we need more funding for that side project as well, preferably before we all get shit on by a flying Kaiju. Love, Bulma.' "

"She could have come down here and said all that to my face."

"She hasn't left that lab in a week. Trust me, not even Vegeta has been able to pry her away."

"I really didn't want to hear that."

"Neither did I, kid."

* * *

Forty years ago a baby was sent to Earth, with the intention that the baby would one day grow up and rid the planet of life. The baby was born from an elite fighting race, know for their raw strength and ruthlessness. Planet clearing was their trade, and they were renown across galaxies. Forty years ago a baby arrived on Earth, hit his head and lost his memories. He never cleared the planet and instead learned the local martial arts, married a one-time princess, had a son. When the son was four years old, a rift was discovered opening deep in the northern ocean. Scientist were flummoxed by its appearance and cause. People didn't know whether to worship the Rift and its mysteries or add their names to the waiting list of Capsule Corporation's newly revealed family-sized space ships.

The warriors of Earth, led by the now young man who'd lost his memories, waited together on the closest island to the Rift, knowing the power emanating from the Rift was anything but benevolent. They were there when the Rift sent out a blast of charged plasma, they were there when the being that had ridden the shockwave up and out finally surfaced.

He claimed to be an alien. He claimed to be the brother of the young leader. He claimed supreme disappointment at the prolific amount of life still teeming on the planet. He didn't claim too much more, not after they defeated him, but with his last breaths he warned them of the future. The technology he'd used to travel there was new, and it would get better in time. More would follow. They would not stop until Earth was theirs.

* * *

At the sound of the buzzing alarm, Trunks jumped out of his bunk and landed solidly on the frigid metal floor, adrenaline already keeping his bare feet from negatively registering the temperature. He slammed a palm against the buzzing comm alarm and hit the lights, fully awake even though the room's clock only read a couple hours past midnight.

"Yeah, Krillin?"

_"Rift activity. Launch in ten."_

"Copy that."

_"Rumor has it your dads are betting on your position in the lineup." _

"When do they not bet on something?"

_"And I'll copy that. Better get Goten going, it's closer to launch in nine now." _

Trunks flicked off the comm and turned his attention to the still sleeping form of his best friend. There wasn't time to waste so Trunks simply gathered the edge of the bottom bunk's mattress with both hands and pulled, sending his copilot, pillow and blanket rolling to the floor.

* * *

Bulma Brief had always done what she wanted. Stubborn and self-absorbed, with the family prestige and brains to actually pull off most of her ideas, there really wasn't a reason not to in her mind. It was no different when she saw the aftereffects of the Rift's first alien encounter. Her friends beaten and left for dead, the landscape decimated and unusable for decades, the future threats. She'd heard the alien's warnings. She heeded them.

It only took four months to design a fighting machine. During that time the warriors had trained as well, and she spent what little free time she had traveling around the world to their training grounds. It reminded her of her teenage years for all the wrong reasons, but she soldiered on and incorporated as much as she could glean from the warriors' recounts. When Piccolo mentioned his pupil's giant ape transformation, she worried she'd thought too small.

Back to the drawing board. Her first prototype that she estimated could take on an Oozaru nearly killed the test pilot. Later analysis showed that his somewhat alien physiology was all that had saved him and proved indisputably that whatever didn't actually kill him would indeed make him stronger. He dogheadedly returned to pilot, repeatedly, until he stopped passing out and seizing, until he could command the machine to do as he wished, until he could channel his ki to direct energy attacks through the machine itself.

When the Rift next showed signs of activity, they were ready. The warriors gathered on the same island, along with Bulma's newly christened Jaeger spooled up and ready for a fight. At the last minute, however, Goku abandoned the Jaeger and met the two intruders alone. The first alien was taken out by his partner, who in turn, very nearly took out Goku. But not before throwing out a false star mimicking the moon's power. Not before transforming into the very thing Bulma's invention could have stopped. By then, though, it was too late. In such a weakened state, there was no way Goku could have stood any chance of piloting the Jaeger.

In that final moment of hopelessness, the forgotten Jaeger started moving. Alone and untrained, Son Gohan had made a snap decision to step in his father's machine. Two minutes later, the final alien was a moment away from death. So was Gohan. Still also Goku.

All three survived. Vegeta, now-marooned prince of an empty race, demanded Bulma and her father build him his own Jaeger. Goku assured her that it would be okay to do, encouraged her even, to keep building more. And Gohan realized the potential in a two-pilot configuration.

The Rift stayed open, but the work didn't stop.

* * *

"Status report. How's the board looking?" Gohan asked, turning the comm on throughout the Command Center. Around him, everyone started settling down, preparing for the long-haul of whatever the Rift was going to throw at them.

_"Dragon Prime, ready," _the sound of Gohan's father filled the Command Center.

_"Royal Renegade, ready. These names are ridiculous." _

"Duly noted, Vegeta," Gohan replied.

_"Emerald Tornado, ready." _

Soft chuckles sounded over the Dragon line. _"Sorry, Vegeta, I bet it's all Goten's fault." _

_"Certainly doubt it was Trunks." _

"Guess he inherited my sleeping habits along with my hair."

_"Hope Four, ready,"_ a breathless Goten finally replied. _"Did we miss anything?" _

"Not this time," Gohan responded. He turned around to Krillin's desk, studying the maps and data flowing on the various screens. "Alright, science pool predicts a Cat-4 terran. Bulma predicts a Cat-3 terran and a Cat-3 water-terran. We're going to split the difference. Tornado, cover the land route. Dragon and Renegade, you two take the sea. Hope, hold the line. We launch as soon as the Rift pops."

_"Copy,"_ came four replies.

* * *

In the days following the encounter with Vegeta, Gohan pondered his time spent in his father's Jaeger. He knew a two-pilot design would be infinitely more adaptable in a fight, even the few minutes he'd spent piloting were enough to see how much mental energy was being wasted just to get the machine to move. There were just too many roadblocks standing in the way of implementing the idea. For starters, it was immediately recognized that the two chosen to pilot should be as close as possible in power and complimentary in temperament. Vegeta and Goku were out, one because Vegeta refused to share headspace with his nemesis and two because Goku confidentially noted that Vegeta wasn't up to his level yet.

"Give it some time, then maybe we'd be ready to try," he'd said in the lab one day.

"Well, what about me and Vegeta?" Gohan had hesitantly offered. The haughty prince scared him more than he liked to admit, but if it was for the greater good of the entire world…

"Oh, that's even more of a power difference," Goku had replied cheerfully. At Gohan's crestfallen look, he'd even laughed.

"You've got it backwards, son," he'd crouched to Gohan's eye level, hands firmly reassuring on Gohan's shoulders. "Don't you know you're the strongest one? I'd have suggested the two of us in a heartbeat if I thought I could keep up."

And then Goku had left to train and eat lunch, one final encouragement to keep at it, things will work out eventually.

* * *

Things had worked out, just not until enough time had passed for them to nearly lose all hope.

Goku had been lost to the Rift in the last encounter. Bulma was left cobbling together the remains of the Dragon they'd recovered into a machine Gohan could use solo and keep Vegeta from defending alone. The first official test run had left Gohan comatose, an unfortunate side effect they had all expected.

The Kami approached Bulma at Gohan's bedside.

"We offer our services," the Kami had announced in greeting, Piccolo nodding in agreement behind him. "We are already one mind, in a sense. And in two months, our remaining kindred will arrive. There is another who is willing to aid in your mission."

And he continued with a neat and logical reasoning, something Bulma could have copied and reproduced in bullet-points for her father's investors. The Kami had split from Piccolo years ago. The events since the Rift's opening had weighed heavily on them both. The Kami had offered to fuse, to become one again, but Piccolo had turned him down. He'd been there the day Gohan had piloted the Dragon. He'd been as curious as he'd been dumbfounded at his student's abilities. And they both had been following the two-pilot Jaeger progress, or lack thereof.

They continued to talk about the practicalities of the guardian of Earth joining the Jaeger program until Gohan woke up. Bulma barely had time to thank the Kami standing beside her that his faculties were still intact and still unarguably Gohan when his first question was on a completely different train of thought.

"But what about your position?" Gohan had blurted out, struggling to keep the hysteria out of his voice. Chi Chi had tried to cajole him to lay back down, but he resisted the hand on his chest and instead moved to sit up further. The Kami had smiled as though he'd expected the boy to say just that. So had the boy's mentor.

"It could be argued, possibly even convincingly, that this does indeed fall under my position's description."

"But we're not hedging that bet, kid," Piccolo added. The boy had listed slightly as his equilibrium failed to keep up with his sudden bout of activity.

"Listen to your mother. You still need to rest." And that was all it took to get him to ease back down without further protest.

The Kami continued, "When a Rift opened on our own home world, our kin did not fare as well as we have here. They did manage to neutralize the first threat, but not without heavy losses. Between the Kaiju attacks and other meteorological events, the planet is nearly uninhabitable. That's why they are traveling here. I've been conversing with their Elder, who was the one to reach out and seek asylum. During the last encounter, when we lost Goku, many of my kin were watching. The elders, the remaining warriors, a few others. One, in particular, followed you throughout the day, Gohan. He's become very attached to this place, mostly because of what he saw through you. The Elder and I believe the young one may be willing to step into my position."

And so they spent another two months redoubling the efforts on a two-pilot system. Kami and Piccolo proved to be the breakthrough they had been waiting for in mapping the intricacies of a shared neural system. As Gohan had predicted, two pilots eased the physical and mental load on each pilot, but it was still too much stress for humans, even the warriors. But the Nameks' constitution and natural regenerative abilities boosted their progress, allowing them to recover quick enough to be a positive use to the test program. By the time the remnant arrived, the other Namekian warrior had not been able to persuade any of his fellows to join in, though he still volunteered. Undeterred, the Kami had assured Bulma that adding a third pilot for their arrangement would work. They were still early enough in building the Namekian Jaeger to accommodate the change, and above all odds, the addition of a third pilot had worked.

* * *

The summer Gohan turned ten brought the rollout of the Emerald Tornado. It also marked the vast uptick in Rift activity. By fall they had barely enough time between encounters to fix the damaged Jaegers and recover physically.

"They remind me of Ice-jin evolutionary rejects," Vegeta commented after one tussle. The flayed remains of a vaguely reptilian monstrosity lay across the battle site. "They really do mean to take this place as its own."

Gohan had given him a curious look.

"Mindless drones," he'd elaborated, "for planet clearing. Similar to what Saiyans do -did. These must be the Oozaru equivalent to a megalomaniac lizard."

Then he'd Final Flashed the remains into oblivion.

* * *

The Rift opened again the very next day, an unfortunate event since Vegeta's Jaeger was halfway through a hydraulic overhaul and the Namekian Jaeger was still missing an arm. There wasn't time to prep Gohan's Jaeger, not when he'd been supporting both rebuilds and still had cracked ribs from his last time piloting. They mustered on Zero Island, all of them, Jaeger pilots and human warriors alike, and braced themselves for whatever would surface.

It was huge, easily the largest creature ever to ride the plasma stream up.

"We really need to start categorizing these things," Bulma had whispered from her spot between Gohan and Vegeta.

And then the thing had opened its mouth and let loose a stream of ki so great, Gohan didn't even bother trying to stop it. He simply powered up and grabbed Bulma and calculated the fastest way to get out of the blast zone. The others, too, had scattered, but only Vegeta had flown away backwards, still facing the creature. He alone witnessed a figure shimmer into the blast's path, solidify into a definite humanoid shape, and bat away the blast like an irritating bug. The figure made quick work of the creature and its constituent bits were ash by the time Gohan rejoined Vegeta, Bulma still in his arms.

"Dad?" he'd breathed out, and Vegeta had stiffened in disbelief. The figure who'd saved them all was bathed in a golden glow.

* * *

_"That's a ridiculous idea, they'd never go for it," _Trunks spoke unconsciously as tethers were fitted on the Hope Four. Goten grunted dismissively and followed up with, _"Yeah, well, of course he cares." _

"Your comm is on, guys."

_"Oh, sorry, Gohan." _

The two boys kept their mouths shut but started an intricate expression war as they waited for the Rift to pop. In the Command Center, their vitals skyrocket as their internally shared conversation continued.

"Write up a script to send their files to my desk, would you, Krillin?" Gohan asked, peering over his shoulder.

"Sure thing, boss."

"I know it's their way of sorting out their headspace but I can't believe what their brains do when they drift."

"It's exhausting to watch," Krillin agreed, "I'm glad I not that compatible with anyone."

"Hmmm," was all Gohan responded with.

* * *

Goku had been home for a month. Since his return there hadn't been a single Rift activity. Goku had gladly jumped back into his Jaeger, but Bulma was already designing improvements to handle the advanced transformation he'd obtained while he was away. Vegeta had called it Super, a level of legendary power very few of their people had reached. Just a couple days earlier, armed with observations from a handful of demonstrations from his father and a history lesson from Vegeta, Gohan had ventured into the mountains and ascended as well.

There was no doubt in Bulma's mind that Vegeta would reach the same, eventually.

Capsule Corporation had always been the main funder of the Jaeger program and the Briefs' family house their unofficial headquarters. Even with the month's worth of peace, they still weren't standing down, though most of the world was already moving on. They had gathered there that afternoon, the pilots and the Briefs, Chi Chi and Krillin, discussing, as usual, the future. Conversation had been that of finding more pilots when it reached a lull and Gohan, who for all his genius still had the tact of a child, proclaimed in all seriousness, "You just need to have more kids."

For a long moment, no one reacted, save for Bulma's next breath catching somewhere in her chest. Gohan had been addressing his father and Vegeta, but he had no way of knowing that not two hours earlier, Bulma had cornered Vegeta and told him she was pregnant.

And then Krillin had started laughing. He gasped as some inner well of humor and mirth erupted and nearly sent him into convulsions.

Vegeta left. Took to the stars in one of the Briefs' riffs on a Namekian space ship. He had disabled the comm system before he was out of the solar system.

Goku didn't go after him, not after Bulma told him her news.

By the time Vegeta returned, Trunks had been born and Chi Chi was pregnant. They'd broken ground on the Base, an intentional step to separate Capsule Corporation from the Jaeger program as the idea started falling out of fashion with shareholders and world leaders. The Med Center had been set up just in time for Goten's birth; Chi Chi labored alone, as the rest of her family had been fighting the first Cat-3 based off Bulma's new classification system.

* * *

The Rift popped, just as the last Jaeger rolled out of the Staging Hangar and tethered up.

"Like we had this thing all planned out," Krillin muttered.

Dragon and Renegade were launched first, overshooting the midpoint to their area which would hopefully put them in line perfectly to the emerging Kaiju. The plasma wave died down and the sensors picked up separate energy signatures.

"Two Cat-3s, just like Bulma said. You guys and your brains sometimes. Scary."

Tornado was maneuvered into its position and Hope trolled the shores by the Command Center, the last stand for the inhabitants there and just beyond the beach.

_"Emerald's tether is released. May three suns shine on you always, sirs." _

_"Call them back!"_ Bulma's voice shrieked throughout the Command Center.

"Bulma, wha-" Gohan started, but was cut off as Bulma's emergency override kicked on. Her face appeared on a vid screen at Krillin's desk. She was running down the halls towards them.

_"So help me, Son Gohan, you call them all back right now."_

"Bulma, they've all been dropped. What's wrong?"

_"It's a trap!"_ she yelled, face lined with fear. _"They're playing us like fools!" _

Gohan let out a sigh, like he'd been holding it in for too long. "Krillin, go secure to the pilots."

"Copy… and you're through."

"Now patch Bulma in and shut down all other external comms."

"Done and done."

"Okay, Bulma, start explaining."

_"My algorithms have predicted the last few encounters with increasing accuracy. Everything has been going so well, I thought we were just reaching optimization." _

_"So you haven't?"_ Goku asked.

_"No, well, probably, but not because we got better. Because they wanted us to think we did." _

_"How are you so sure?"_ Nail asked over Tornado's comm.

_"Because I'm married to Vegeta. Because I befriended Goku at sixteen. Because I live on Earth and NOTHING EVER GOES THIS WELL." _

Bulma burst throughout the Command Center doors. She dropped her vid screen on Krillin's desk, for one dizzying rotation creating a fractaled kaleidoscope as it caught its own image back on itself a hundredfold until Krillin switched off both screens.

"She's right," Gohan agreed, locking eyes with Bulma for one terrifying moment. "She's right, or pretty close to it. Something's been off for a while now and I haven't been able to put my finger on it."

_"So what should we expect here?"_ Goku asked.

"I'm not sure exactly."

"Bulma, go with your instincts," Gohan urged. "Say what's on your mind, no matter how unusual."

"I'd expect their power levels to be higher than a normal Cat-3. Probably faster and smarter, too."

_"All indicators point to average Cat-3s, Bulma." _

"You all suppress your power levels, don't you?"

Gohan made his way to the cabinet in the corner. "Bulma, you're in charge here. Krillin, back her up."

He pulled off his jacket and dress shirt and donned a set of vest armor. An old scouter repurposed for its comm went on next. He strapped on his broadsword last. "Krillin, restore comms to the Center, but keep all open airs encrypted."

"Copy and done."

"All hands, all hands, we are going to Red Alert. Repeat, Red Alert. Secure all entrances and lockdown in five minutes." He powered up partially, enough to give off a light glow. "Tell Mom not to worry." And he was gone.

Bulma watched as he flew out through the Staging Hangar narrowly making it through the already closing doors to the docks.

_"Okay, new plan,"_ Gohan's voice sounded through his scouter and into the Command Center. _"Head for land, all of you. Hope, head for the dock. Stay in a defensive position to guard the Base. Do not engage elsewhere. Tornado, keep to your battlefield. Try to minimize damage to Gingertown. Dragon, Renegade, just keep backing up until you reach shore. I'm headed your way. Everyone, if you think it best to go hand-to-hand, do it." _

The two bogeys which had been tracking predictably along their trajectories suddenly sped up. Bulma called out the new velocities, but the one headed towards Goku and Vegeta kept accelerating.

_"Careful Vegeta, this thing is holding back." _

_"I can tell, Kakaro-" _the sound of screeching metal cut off the rest of Vegeta's reply. The Command Center erupted in a frenzy as the right side of Royal Renegade's stats flatlined.

_"Vegeta!"_ Goku yelled. Dragon's stats lit up next as Goku jumped into an advanced Kaouken. Krillin felt Bulma's hands grip his shoulders as she kept her eyes fixed on the still-beating vital of Vegeta's heart rate. Krillin brought up the long view and tiny profiles outlined the battle taking place still in fifty feet of water on the coast.

A tiny blip of light representing Gohan's lone flight came into view as he neared. His scouter picked up sounds of the battle between the bogey and Goku. Vegeta's Jaeger remained agonizingly still.

_"Almost there, Dad. Be ready in three, two, one." _ Gohan's light stopped over the bogey and the sounds of his own fight took over. He worked with his father to draw the bogey away from Vegeta and in a reverse move Dragon Prime blinked out of position to appear at Renegade's side. Just as the bogey turned towards them, both blinked out of view and Gohan fought to keep its attention. It obliged.

A startled surprise rose up in the Base as two Jaegers appeared in the sealed Staging Hangar. Both were still running and the noise from one functional Jaeger and one struggling was enough to send all ground personnel scrambling. Backdraft from engines blew dirt and debris everywhere. Before the receiving crew could get close, Dragon once again disappeared.

_"Dad?"_ Goten and Trunks responded as Dragon appeared on the docks outside.

_"Not now, boys. Keep to the plan."_ And then the stats showed Goku had started emergency shutdown on the Dragon.

* * *

When Gohan turned fifteen, he'd been summoned to the Lookout. That in itself wasn't new, since the arrival of the last Nameks, Gohan had become close friends with the new Guardian, Dende, and had been a frequent visitor. But this time, his parents had been asked to join him. The Sons had left Goten with the Briefs and the three made the journey up to the Lookout. They arrived to find the four Earth Nameks as well as a stout blue alien with sunglasses, a slim purple alien with a mohawk, and a larger pink alien who looked entirely out of place and rather grumpy about being there.

Their proposal would have been unbelievable if those present hadn't lived the lives they had.

"But… I'm not dead," was Gohan's first response.

"The living are allowed to travel in the Otherworld -we are alive, as are some beings who dwell there, few though they are," the purple one had answered.

"It's mortals who are restricted," his pink companion had growled.

"Which is why we received special compensation for you."

"But all that you said, how long will it take to accomplish?"

"Weeks, months, years. It depends on you."

"Years?! I can't afford to be gone for years!"

"Gohan," his father interjected softly, "we may not be able to afford it if you don't go."

And he'd looked at his parents fully. Both had tears in their eyes.

"So I take this path-"

"Snake Way," the Kami had clarified.

"-And I follow it to a planet where I'll train-"

"We'll work on your humor, too, boy," the blue alien assured, sunglasses glinting in the ever-present sun.

"-And then I'll go to another planet to train some more."

"We're still working on the specifics," the purple one said. "It'll depend on the timeframe."

"The timeframe that I'll set."

"Right… Somewhat."

"When does all this start?"

"Today, if you're ready."

"Heh, happy birthday," Dende had offered.

"Hn, I've had worse," Gohan had mused. "Do you have some paper and a pen?"

The Kami procured a pad of Lookout stationary for him. Gohan spent a few minutes writing out equations and proofs and diagrams. Once finished he folded the papers in half and handed them to his mother. "Those are for Bulma, she'll know what to do with them."

He hugged her and his father in turn, then presented himself to the rest of the gathered group.

"Let's get this started."

* * *

The shutdown had barely cleared danger levels when all of Goku's vitals flatlined. A figure -his figure- appeared on the top of the Renegade at the opening made where the right side had been ripped and flattened.

"Contact with the Tornado bogey in thirty seconds," Krillin announced grimly, keeping tabs on the other areas still in play. Bulma barely registered his response, eyes fixed on the hole Goku had jumped into. Every heartbeat took a small lifetime until he emerged with Vegeta, arms slung around shoulders for support. He looked straight at her and nodded once. Vegeta was okay.

Goku passed him off to a medic and popped into the Command Center. He headed straight for the cabinet Gohan had gone for, pulling out another scouter and vest.

"You saved us, B," he acknowledged, shucking off the bulkier articles of his flight suit for the simpler armor. "How's Gohan doing?"

"Holding his own."

Goku turned a scouter on and listened to the two battles raging on either side of the ocean. There was a brief hesitation as he decided on which way to go before Gohan's voice, strained with exertion urged his father elsewhere. _"Go to Tornado, they don't know what they're up against. I'll be fine." _

_"Like hell you are,"_ Piccolo's gruff voice interrupted. _"We're on land. Have you even made it to shore yet?" _

A hearty splash and the thunderous noise of churning water answered for him. Goku sought out his son and the thing fighting him, and disappeared from the Command Center once more.

* * *

Gohan returned to the Lookout after eleven months and two weeks. He'd barely spotted Dende at the other end of the platform when a flying ball of much-missed familiar energy latched itself to his side.

"GOHAN!" his brother yelled in his ear. And he'd turned around to see his parents behind him and he had never felt so happy to be home.

They didn't stay at the Lookout long before Goku brought them all back to where they had been when he'd felt his son return. Goten orbited in oblong rings around Gohan's head, peppering him with an endless stream of questions he didn't bother waiting for answers.

"Did you walk all the way there? What did you eat? Was it cold? Why didn't you bring a jacket? Where did you get these clothes? Can I try out your sword?"

"Goten," Chi Chi said with unending patience, "what do we say about flying circles around people?"

"It usually disorients them and should only be done in an emergency or while training." He landed but proceeded to take long hovering jumps to keep up with the rest of the family and still make it to Gohan's eye level more often than not.

"He doesn't tire out yet?" Gohan whispered to his mother.

"Not really, no," she whispered back with a grin.

"Where are we?"

"Bunker below Capsule Corporation." Goku answered. "There's been some, ah… developments while you were away."

They neared the end of the long hall just as an entire section slid open. The Briefs were waiting. Trunks, in similar Goten fashion, flew towards him, but stopped just short of a hug. Gohan snagged him anyway and he didn't resist.

"You look more and more like your dad, kid," Bulma added as she waited to greet him.

"So what developments happened? Anything good?"

"Androids," Bulma said grimly.

* * *

Goku appeared to watch the creature lash a surprisingly prehensile tail into the water and emerge with Gohan wrapped up at the end. Before he could help, the _shnnk_ of a blade cut through the air and the tip of the tail fell away from the rest of the beast and Gohan emerged, sword in hand. A few more deft swings and the rest of the tail and two legs were severed. Goku followed with a Kamehameha. It didn't take the thing down completely, and it ended up getting one lucky swing at Gohan that sent him into the water once more.

Over the scouters Tornado called for the one minute countdown to release a Special Beam Cannon. Goku and Gohan spent a few more minutes past the release of the cannon finishing their own cleanup.

"How many pieces did it end up in?"

"Six. I got all of the tail and the left leg."

"I got the other arm and the rest of the body."

"That's it then."

"We should check to see if Tornado needs backup."

_"Not quite, no,"_ the Kami's voice replied over the comm. _"But you are going to want to see this anyway. Bulma, too." _

* * *

- End -

* * *

Notes: This is the first chapter of the most writing in the least amount of time I have pumped out, ever. Even better, some semblance of a plot finally emerged, which rarely happens for me. The whole thing started with how cool it would be to see the various fusion pairs piloting Jaegers, and indeed, the first paragraphs of Trunks and Goten were the first written. Gohan, however, took over. As usual. I don't fight it anymore. Seriously, though, I'm super excited about this one, yes indeedy.

Happy Cell Games Day!

* * *

052614


	2. Chapter 2

**Pacific Dragon  
****~ Lady Eldaelen ~**

* * *

Previously:

"We should check to see if Tornado needs backup."

_"Not quite, no," _the Kami's voice replied over the comm. _"But you are going to want to see this anyway. Bulma, too." _

* * *

- Start -

Like all previous encounters, Tornado's battle site was the usual grizzly horror of destruction. Craters littered the area as both Jaeger and beast were thrown to the ground. The telltale gouge of a beam cannon blast cut a trench nearly a mile long and the remainders of the Cat-3 lay on either side of it, severed in half by the beam cannon's intensity. A few parts were still smoldering. The recovery team was already at work, setting up floodlights so they could see in the early morning hours, prepping the Tornado Jaeger for tether, documenting the damage of both machine and environment.

Tornado's top had been opened up, the escape hatches engaged. Its three pilots were gathered a ways off, down towards the end of the trench. Bulma, Gohan, and Goku headed their way, Bulma and Gohan, as usual, taking longer as they captured as many details of the scene as possible.

"Smells different from the other one," Gohan murmured. "More mammalian."

"Better musculature development for land," Bulma agreed. "Scans showed bipedal as primary motorization for the entire fight."

"Look at that fight path. Three, four, trip sites at such close range. That thing was fast and maneuverable. A lot more agile than the last few."

"We might be on the edge of another incline."

"Don't say that. We barely scraped together enough improvements to survive the last one."

At this point they had drawn up to the rest of the group. The senior medic for the Tornado crew was hovering near the pilots, surreptitiously taking what vitals he could on the fringes. Three water bottles hung from his belt, sure sign the pilots' attention was too wrapped up in whatever was in the trench to care about post-battle procedures. What little conversation had been taking place immediately ceased. Gohan peered over the edge of the trench. At the end, and what had probably stopped the beam cannon from blasting further along the ground, stuck out a slightly charred but still intact leg.

A Jaeger leg.

"That's impossible," Bulma exclaimed. Beside her, Gohan felt his throat go dry. He tapped his scouter to a secure line.

"Krillin?"

_"Yeah, Gohan?" _

"I need visual confirmation on Hope Four."

_"Hope Four just completed docking procedures. Pilot disengage in process. The boys should be out in ten." _

"Copy that," Goku followed up after several moments when Gohan didn't respond.

A hand gently pulled Gohan's left arm out to his side. It was enough to break him out of his trance.

"You're bleeding, sir." And Tornado's medic began rinsing out a deep rend along Gohan's bicep, a corresponding line cutting across the front of his armor halfway through its thickness. He winced as the medic applied medicated salve to fill the wound until Gohan's body healed itself. Not even a minute passed before he'd finished wrapping the whole thing up.

"Are you hurt anywhere else, sirs?" the medic asked.

Again, Goku answered for the both of them when Gohan didn't respond, "No, thank you."

"Bulma, what-"

"I don't know, Gohan."

"But how-"

"I don't know."

"We would have picked it up on our sensors if there was any power left. This area has been cleared for months as a battle site. No activity. For months."

"That has to have been down there longer than that."

"But it shouldn't be there at all."

And before he could be stopped, Gohan had flown off towards the leg, down in the trench. Up close, the evidence was even more incredible.

* * *

It had only been a few days since Goku had been lost to the Rift. Gohan had spent all of that time in West City's Wukong Hospital, heavily sedated as he recovered. Bulma had checked in that morning to find Chi Chi frantic, Gohan's bed empty. Bulma led the way back to her house. She just had a feeling.

He was there in her lab, in the part where he spent most of his time, where his projects were stored. Where _the_ project was stored. It was still mostly skeleton, but they'd been testing out new skins for Goku and Vegeta's Jaegers and had determined the latest alloy was going to work. Both legs had been fully plated for the tests and in one of the brief moments of levity, Gohan had ki-etched their mantra onto one of the shins.

_HOPE_

Standing unbalanced in the lab now, he clutched a side of more broken ribs than whole, wavering slightly under his own still-depleted power. They could hear his cries from the door, labored breaths from lungs damaged after nearly drowning, echoing in the near-empty lab. For the life of her, Bulma could hardly recall any moment when Gohan looked so completely broken. This was the first time since maybe their initial meeting that he looked like the child she usually forgot he was.

"Gohan, stop that this instant," Chi Chi's voice stalled the boy's hand. Bulma hadn't noticed what his free hand was doing but the other woman's words had stilled the boy halfway through etching out _HOPE_ with another beam of ki.

"There's nothing left, mom," he sobbed through a hiccup. The ki beam wavered, making a little spiral in the middle of the 'O'. Chi Chi walked up to her son, nearly in front of him, much closer than Bulma ever would have gotten to an unsteady half-Saiyan wielding a live ki beam. She reached out and placed steady fingers on his wrist, inches from the energy nexus.

"We both know that's not true. And he wouldn't want you like this."

Gohan's energy flickered and died. The boy had crumpled -_crumpled_- in his mother's arms and she held the strongest being on the planet until he ran out of tears.

* * *

_HOPE_

Gohan hesitated, fingers millimeters away from the etched metal. Then he let them slide over the extra line through the 'H' that ended at the odd spiral squiggle in the 'O'. He could even see the faint ring around the word where Bulma had riveted an extra doubler to the inside of the plate to reinforce his moment of despair.

Gohan felt his father jump down behind him with Bulma. "The odds of this being a reproduction are so high."

Bulma agreed. "It's impossible."

* * *

It'd been the first evening. Her mother and Chi Chi were in the kitchen cleaning up. Gohan had finally nodded off in the living room where the celebration had been going for most of the day. Vegeta had long since disappeared, only after forcing a promise from Goku to spar in the morning. Bulma found herself making rounds, locking up even though her father had probably done the same thing when he'd retired earlier in the evening. When she got to her lab, she was only partially surprised to find Goku had snuck in. He was examining the new equipment.

"This is amazing, Bulma, what you guys have done since I was-"

"Don't finish that, Son."

And she had marched him over to Gohan's project. She had all but shoved his face up against the halfway crossed out word that meant so much more to his son than the definition. She had told him about the days after he'd left. The weeks. The months and years. He wasn't family, not like his own, not like hers, but that only made it all the more raw. They could be blunt and sharp with each other, and in this verbal form she help the upper hand to beat him down and claim a victory she didn't want.

* * *

Bulma set up a guard patrol to keep the area secure and rang Tien and Chiaotzu for backup. Then she ordered everyone else back to the Base for debrief.

Trunks and Goten were perched on either side at the foot of Vegeta's bed in the Med Center. He was awake but suffering the effects of electrical feedback from the damage to his Jaeger. Hypersensitivity to movement, it wasn't fatal and would wear off in time, but was always trying on his patience.

As the remaining pilots and Bulma filed into the Med Center, the boys moved in tandem. Goten threw his arms around Goku, Trunks his mom. They both converged on Gohan, who bit back a slight hiss as the boys wrapped him in a tight hug. The senior Med Center tech immediately had him in an exam room with orders to get the other four pilots back on the post-flight procedure and examined as well.

An hour later, they were all crowded around Vegeta's bed again. Goku, the kids and the Nameks were cleared, Gohan was on light duty until a severely strained back and the gash on his arm healed. They made a plan to send the Hope tether crew to the Tornado battle site when the sun came out. Salvage was already working on excavating the rest of the Jaeger from the ground with Tien and Chiaotzu's skills to guide. Renegade's mechanic had been by to deliver the news that the core was unsalvageable, which rendered it useless except for scrap.

"It'll take a month to get another core built," Bulma muttered angrily after the mechanic had left, sending both boys from the armrests of her chair back to the foot of Vegeta's bed.

"There's always the Fighter," Gohan mused from his spot leaning carefully against the wall. Beside him, his father nearly jumped across the room, expression brightening.

"The Fusion Fighter is configured for two," Bulma articulated slowly, unsure if she was ready for what the line of thought would unleash.

"I know," Gohan answered evenly. And he'd eyed Vegeta, who was minimizing his movements and staring up at the ceiling. The prince snuck a glance at Gohan that promised a reckoning later, then he closed his eyes and ever so slowly brought a hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose.

"Kakarott, my answer is only because I refuse to wait for another single Jaeger to be built from scratch. I do not want to hear any talk of 'finally' or 'this was meant to be' or any of that nonsense. Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal, Vegeta," Goku had responded evenly, though the grin on his face made it look like he'd been handed chopsticks and a stack of plates at a buffet. Vegeta snapped his head over to glare at Goku, which sent a spasm through his entire body.

"We can talk more later, come on boys, let Vegeta rest," and he all but skipped out, taking the two youngest with him.

Gohan followed slower, Piccolo at his side.

"They're ready," Gohan voiced, mostly to himself, though he'd long since claimed Piccolo as his sounding board. They stopped by the Mess, where Gohan was the only one to grab a meal, but one of the Tornado mechanics dropped off a bottle of water next to Piccolo before scurrying back to a table full of other mechs and engineers. Conversation slowed in the Mess, as it often did, but once Gohan finished and they were making their way back to the personal quarters, the commentary continued. "We already pair them up more often than not. Dad's been itching to try drifting for years. He almost asked you once, did I ever tell you? But as soon as he brought it up he discounted it. Something about needing to keep certain things sacred. I think it had to do with your link to Kami."

They said their goodbyes at Gohan's room, for a few hours at least. Gohan was dead to the world long before Piccolo retreated to the top of the Base to meditate.

* * *

By sunrise, Gohan was back in the Command Center reviewing the files from Trunks and Goten's drift. They were even more critical now that his father and Vegeta would soon be preparing to for their own drift. He'd been tracking their compatibility obliquely since the two pilot system had been more than theoretical and had files on all the warriors' compatibilities even though the physical requirements were too much for the humans. In practice, the Nameks had a stronger drift together than Trunks and Goten, but all Gohan's evaluations pointed to two full-Saiyan pilots having the strongest drift of them all.

They would start modifying the Fighter that afternoon, adjusting the control deck for two adults instead of Trunks and Goten, as originally intended. Once Vegeta recovered, he'd start training in the sims with Goku.

* * *

"The androids were an experiment carried out by Dr. Gero, of Red Ribbon. They couldn't compete with our Jaegers, but they wanted in on the defense contracts. It was a secret until about three months ago when Gero was killed by one of them and they all escaped," Bulma had explained in the common room of her family's bunker. "They started rejecting their programming and became fully autonomous, or rather reverted back. They were alive once -Gero used humans as the basis for their designs."

"Krillin here actually saved one," Goku interjected cheerfully.

"Not one of my brightest moments," Krillin answered sheepishly.

"Probably not, but it turned out to be fortuitous for us. Since then she's become an ally. She even tried getting her brother and fellow creation to join the Jaeger program as pilots."

"But he wants nothing to do with us and humans as a whole," Goku said with a slight hint of frustration.

"So you let him go?"

"Yes, we did, son. We had to. He wasn't a threat anymore."

Gohan had seen the unease in Vegeta's eyes -he for one, probably had not agreed with that decision.

"Eighteen has been a great help already. Mapping her neural path alone has improved the Tornado drift thirty percent. Between her input and the information you left me, we were able to configure Hope for the boys."

* * *

The proportions of the unidentified Jaeger looked funny even upside down and in a hole. Bulma commandeered a flat flier from the Salvage crew and flew it to the bottom of the hole. The smaller head dome showed more signs of wear even under the layer of grime. The shoulders were narrower as well.

They helped maneuver the tethers in place and the whole thing was pulled out onto level ground. The backside produced the most damning evidence as only one escape hatch was visible between the shoulders.

"Let's check the stamp."

By the exit of every Jaeger was a fingerprint and blood sample of each pilot. It was half safety measure, half Jaeger calibration. The samples were the first step in the neural net's interface with the machine. The Hope Four safely docked in the Staging Hangar had samples from Trunks and Goten, the only pilots ever to run Hope's controls. Bulma could remember that day clearer than few others. She'd pricked Trunks' finger, Gohan pricked Goten's, then they'd pressed the boys' fingers on the identifier and started up the neural net. Bulma pulled out her analyzer and checked the power as they pulled up along the door and this Hope's identifier.

Bulma snatched Gohan's fingers away before he could touch the first of the three fingerprints there.

"Let me scan them first." She ran the analyzer over all three prints and waited for the tests to run.

"This Jaeger is too small for three," Gohan puzzled as the analyzer beeped and Bulma reviewed the results. She felt herself pale.

"What? Who are they?"

"One is unidentifiable," she started, each word a little softer than the last. "One is Trunks."

"And the last?"

"You."

* * *

Goku helped test most of the neural net designs in the lab and on the first of the prototypes. Once his Jaeger was built and Goku started using it regularly, Gohan took over testing the upgrades and new systems. The unspoken agreement was that the next machine they worked on would be Gohan's machine, until Vegeta had expressed interest in, re: demanded rather forcefully, a Jaeger of his own. Gohan continued to fight encounters hand to hand, or in rare instances another Jaeger if Goku or Vegeta weren't available.

Hope had always been Gohan's project. Hope was always supposed to be his. After the encounter that saw Goku lost, all that changed. Just as silently and determinately as he'd designed the still-mostly skeletal machine for himself, he rejected it. In the years before Goku's return, if Gohan was needed to fight, he used the rebuilt Dragon or fought alone. Hope remained unfinished, untouched, until the work with the Nameks proved the two-pilot system. After Goku returned, Gohan had toyed with the idea of Hope being the dual machine for Goku and Vegeta. He never truly gave up hope for others, for the future, but everyone understood he'd given it up for himself.

* * *

"Me?" Gohan asked in surprise.

Bulma pocketed her analyzer and pried open the escape hatch. The whole Jaeger was tilted, without a level enough surface for standing so she held a light as Gohan flew inside. Gohan checked the power system, which had the deadest batteries they'd ever seen.

He pulled the main computer components and neural nets installed in the Control Deck and passed them up to Bulma. Before leaving, Gohan examined the pilot controls. As the outer structure had hinted at, it was built for one. The single control unit was mounted in the center of the deck platform. Without strapping in, he hovered along the setup.

"Too small for you," Bulma noted.

"And a little too big for Trunks."

"Alright, I think we've got enough for now. You shouldn't be flying anyway."

"Shouldn't be moving all this stuff either," he quipped as he helped her rearrange their contraband more evenly on the flier so they wouldn't drop any on the way back to the Base.

* * *

After he returned from the Otherworld, Gohan had only gotten a few polite and very general inquiries as to what he'd been up to all year. He'd asked Krillin about the behavior, not that it hadn't been welcomed since he really wasn't sure how to explain half of what he'd experienced himself.

"Oh, that. That was all Goku. He made it clear early on that what you were doing was personal. We were welcome to go ask Dende, if we couldn't contain the curiosity. All we really knew was that the Kais had chosen you for special training. No one begrudges you that, kid."

Krillin had leaned back in his chair and stretched out. He swiveled around to face Gohan in the otherwise empty Command Center. Out the windows, the early morning crews were beginning to set up for the day.

"Sure hope they taught you something useful for here and now though. It'd be nice for a break for once."

* * *

Back in the lab, Bulma got to work hooking up the equipment to a clean setup in the shielded room they used for isolating test systems. The entire room had been cleared of the half-built systems and other electronics usually stored there.

"Did you get any sleep this morning?" Gohan asked as he peered at the boxes of parts now lining the wall outside the shielded room.

"A couple hours. This was more important."

Gohan took up a spot on the couch where Vegeta soon joined him. He was moving slower and held his posture more stiffly than usual, but at least the neural effects were lessened enough that he could move around freely. Not long after that, Chi Chi brought in lunch for everyone.

"Goku's got the boys for afternoon training. I think Nail was with them."

"And… the hookups are done." Bulma announced, taking a bite of her sandwich in triumph. "Fresh batteries, isolated recording, transmitting blocked." She waited, her finger over the power button, and glanced over at Gohan. He nodded once and moved closer to see the terminal display as the system booted up. It wasn't even halfway through the process before Bulma was on the comm. "Krillin? Pull off all nonessential crew from the trench. Set up Level One security. No one but warriors are allowed within 200 yards of that extra Jaeger. Get Goku on the line."

_"Copy, Bulma." _

She locked down the lab and opened the inner doors to the back room. _"Hey, Bulma, what's up?" _

"Goku, I need you to bring the dug up Jaeger to my back lab. Don't tell anyone anything. I'll let Tien know to expect you."

Before she could get him to confirm, he and the Jaeger appeared in the back lab.

"Sorry, but the boys are still exhibiting post-drift behavior and I wanted to try a few things before they fade. Wanna come, Vegeta?" Goku paused as he noticed the tension, "Oh, what's the problem?"

Vegeta was eyeing Bulma with something like concern at her shell-shocked expression. Gohan was gripping the edge of the desk with enough force to leave finger imprints in the metal. Bulma started once, but had to clear her voice and try again. "This software is dated twenty years from now."

Goku blinked. "Like, in the future?"

* * *

- End -

* * *

Notes: Yes, we are going there. Also, drifting as an analog to fusion was pretty much the basis for pairing these two worlds together. As a general rule I really hated the Buu saga, but I didn't watch it until about four years after I'd last watched Cell or any DBZ, so between the nostalgia factor and the complete lunacy of most of that arc, Buu and all it encompasses never really had a chance. The fusions, though, or rather the potential that fusions bring to the dynamic of the characters, those plot bunnies could spawn all day.

* * *

060314


End file.
